“There is no reason to evacuate settlements in a peace agreement,” Gabbay said on Monday night. “If there is peace, then why evacuate? The dynamics of peacemaking that would require evacuation may not actually be correct. In a peace agreement, solutions can be found that do not require evacuations.”

However, his words

sparked outrage by many on the left of the political dial in Israel.

Zionist Union MKs openly distanced themselves from Gabbay, the head of the union, the Labor Party and what is called "the peace camp" after he promised publicly that settlements would not have to be evacuated as part of a peace agreement with the Palestinians should it be orchestrated by him.

Why should the "left" (never to be described as "extreme" or "far-left") be angry and upset? And even outraged?

Is it because they are against peace? Coexistence? Friendly neighborly relationships? Cooperation on issues of environment, economy, agriculture, industry and more?

Are they really, in their own way, pro-apartheid? Separating the populations permanently - but only in a "Palestine", the Arab state-to-be? Separation is a no-no within Israel proper. Their solution is the Three States in Palestine one: one mixed Jewish Arab state, Israel, and two Arabs-only states: "Palestine" and Jordan.

It would seem that a Jewish presence in the areas originally mandated for Jews to reconstitute their national homeland with the right of "close settlement" on the land (Article 6), is verboten. The left accepts the premise advanced by Arabs that Jews really have no historical, religious, cultural or legal rights in their own homeland. Mahmoud Abbas' words about Jews' "filthy feet" that "defile", as regards Jews entering the Temple Mount, are perhaps a signpost for the extreme left.

This is immoral and illogical.

But that never bothered the left.

Even MKs in his own party went aghast. Nachman Shai wrote: "We will have to separate from the Palestinians, we will have to evacuate settlements with pain and sorrow" and Ksenia Svetlova said, "only a political settlement and separation from the Palestinians will ensure the existence of the State of Israel..."